KEY POINTS:
MP Pita Sharples says creating Maori wards or guaranteed seats in Auckland local authority areas will ensure tangata whenua play a meaningful role in governance.
Dr Sharples said the Royal Commission of Inquiry on Auckland Governance was a chance for Maori to gain representation and correct a major failure of democracy.
"Like most places, Auckland's record of choosing Maori through the ballot box is abysmal," he said. "I could name lists of Maori people, national figures in anyone's eyes, sporting icons, former MPs, leading academics and jurists, people with all the requisite skills, who have stood for council and been rebuffed.
"They never got close.
"Our people see no place for themselves, so they take no interest in council business, even though the issues are hugely important in their lives."
One way to honour the Maori vision of partnership was to create Maori wards, said Dr Sharples.
Auckland councils set up Maori advisory committees or a formal Maori subcommittee of the council.
But he said such committees could not make effective decisions without solid and clear information. They needed staff to prepare quality advice. Instead, respectable elders and community leaders were left to look like figureheads without power.
Dr Sharples said most debate about local government reform focused on how bigger councils could still respond to the views of small communities.
"The question should be: 'How have those local communities represented the voices of the communities of tangata whenua in their midst?'"
